


Fade and Then Return

by delicateclarity



Series: The Skies Do Not Fall [2]
Category: Kings
Genre: Angst, Complicated Relationships, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Miscarriage, Post canon, Post-Canon, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-05
Updated: 2014-08-05
Packaged: 2018-02-11 18:25:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,952
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2078472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/delicateclarity/pseuds/delicateclarity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And here she is, in prison with him two years later, with the glow and sparkle of the world gone and her only way out to have a baby. And she's - too young, and not for the first time Jack feels stabbing regret about using her the way he did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fade and Then Return

**Author's Note:**

> Well - series ended up happening! Takes place after "Almost Martyrs" and I highly recommend you go read that first. You can check out my blog [here](http://smilingbucky.tumblr.com). Thanks very much to my beta [Courtney](http://blessbuckybarnes.tumblr.com)!

The morning after, he feels like the coming of spring after a long winter, feels the snow and ice inside him start to crack and melt away. The sun beams into their room that morning, and for once it doesn’t feel like taunts and cold words.

For the first time Jack can remember, he doesn’t feel crushed under an insurmountable weight, pressure pushing down on him until he can’t breathe.

He looks at Lucinda and he sees warmth and hope. He lets himself forget about his father, about Michelle, about David, and he just eats breakfast opposite Lucinda. They talk, but not about the day before. It’s trite, and blissfully dull, play-acting at a life they don’t have.

They don’t talk about the eggs in the nest, either, despite the fact they’re both sneaking glances at it. But Jack can’t stop thinking about it - he’s had almost 30 years of his father’s mysticism and religious symbolism, after all. Lucinda’s face is indecipherable as she looks at it.

But they don’t talk about it, even when she brings a hand to her stomach and stares at it as if she’s a million miles away.

***

When Lucinda tells him two months later, he’s not surprised.

She whispers it into the dark, sounding scared and asking, “What happens now, Jack?”

He knows the answer, he thinks. His parents won’t let him touch his child, afraid he’ll ruin it, dirty it.

He won’t lie to her. “They’ll take it from us. My parents will raise it, or an army of nannies, and we’ll never see it. But they’ll let us go. They don’t want me here, anyway, and you’re only here because of me. After they have an heir they won’t need me anymore. They’ll exile us. Won’t kill us, my mother won’t allow it,” he says.

Her breathing is deceptively even, but he knows she’s far from calm. The fact that she’s been able to handle everything thrown at her these past couple of years is incredible, but he knows that it’s been hard on her.

Reaching out for her, he takes her hand in his, feels her squeeze it like a lifeline. He waits.

Privately, he agrees with his parents about allowing him to be around the child. Before he had met Lucinda she had been a naive girl with ambitions and dreams, awestruck by the prince she had wondered at for so long.

And here she is, in prison with him two years later, with the glow and sparkle of the world gone and her only way out to have a _baby_. And she's - too young, and not for the first time Jack feels stabbing regret about using her the way he did. 

“So what do we do after?” she asks, timid.

He murmurs so nobody can hear but her. “I’ll take us out of the country. Maybe to Gath, maybe somewhere else. Somewhere safe. I’ll protect you, if I can, and if you want me to. Or I could leave you alone and you can make your way in the world. Find someone that loves you, really loves you. You could do anything, Lucinda.”

In the dim light, he sees that she looks conflicted, but she doesn’t say anything else, so he closes his eyes and lets himself fall asleep.

He dreams of a swarm of crows breaking into the robin’s nest, tearing into the eggs while the parents watch on a nearby branch.

He startles awake, sweating, and with a cold feeling of dread settling deep in his stomach.

***

The next morning, after breakfast, Thomasina comes, walking in and surveying the room.

Lucinda must have told the guards before he woke up.

Thomasina barely speaks, and Jack does his absolute best to pretend she’s not even there. He doesn’t trust her, despite all his years of knowing her. She’s loyal to his father, and he knows she would do anything to protect him - anything. She takes Lucinda from the room, to the doctor’s, and Jack’s eyes don’t leave Lucinda as she walks out with her head high, face pulled into a mask.

He waits, and decidedly does not think about their potential futures. God has had a nasty habit of pulling the rug out from under him and screwing him over, and he doesn’t have any reason to believe this will be any different.

Lucinda comes back alone after an hour, the door closing behind her with a quiet click. He looks up at her and she just nods, a hand placed on her stomach protectively.

***

The Queen visits the next day.

“The doctor says it’s a boy,” she says, by way of greeting. Jack doesn’t say anything, so she continues. “Your father and I want to congratulate you two.”

He finds himself laughing. “Of course you do,” he says. “Well, thanks very much, but that doesn’t mean a whole lot from inside a prison cell.”

Lucinda says nothing, just watches the Queen from behind hooded eyes.

“That’s why I’m here, actually. We think it would be best for the pregnancy if Lucinda came to live with us, allowed to roam the full of the palace, instead of being in here for the remaining seven months or so,” she says, looking between the two of them.

Jack immediately clams up, tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth. They want to separate them, they know what Jack is planning, they have to. They can’t, they can’t -

“Would Jack be coming with me, as well?” Lucinda’s voice is cool, even though Jack can see her fingernails digging into the upholstery by her thigh.

His mother shakes her head. “My husband will never allow it. There are some things even I can’t manage.”

“Then, I will have to thank you for your generous offer, but I must decline. I won’t be separated by my husband, especially at a time like this. I would rather spend the rest of my life in here than be parted from him,” Lucinda says, looking every bit the royal she was meant to be as she looks up at the queen.

He thinks his mother is almost smiling, and he finds himself at a loss, so he says nothing.

“I’m quite certain the King won’t be pleased to hear that, but I’m sure I’ll be able to talk him down,” she says, and after a few moments, she continues. “It’s nice to know my son can inspire such... loyalty.”

Lucinda smiles, looks over at Jack with bright eyes. “It’s not loyalty,” she says. “It’s love.”

The room is tense. Everyone knows the conversation is much less polite and calm than it appears on the surface, so the sharp look in his mother’s eyes is not a surprise.

She looks back at Jack, and he returns it with as much intensity as he can manage. “It’s good to see you, Jack,” she says, and makes her way for the door. “Take care.”

When the door closes, Lucinda immediately deflates, looking exhausted and a little frightened.

“I don’t think I can do this without you,” she murmurs. “I know I can’t.”

He doesn’t have a response to that, so he just places a hand on her knee and says, “You would have made a damn good queen, though.”

It shouldn’t be funny, he’s completely serious, but for reasons unknown to both of them, after a few moments, they’re laughing. He feels like he has more control over the situation when he’s pretending it’s not as dire as it actually is.

The next few weeks are busy, and the staff is definitely pampering Lucinda and keeping a close watch on her, despite allowing her to remain with Jack.

Things are okay. Lucinda is in great health, Jack is starting to probe the guards for news in the morning, and he’s listening. He gets a few snatches, tales of unrest in the country. There’s nothing about David, or Michelle. Somehow, he thinks that’s probably for the best.

***

And then it happens. When he thinks back on it, it’s a blur. He remembers a gasp and looking up to find Lucinda staring at him, hand clutching at her stomach. He thinks she was saying his name, but he only remembers a rushing in his ears at the realization that there is blood dripping down her leg.

He runs to the door, yelling for the guards to help, someone _help_ , and he takes Lucinda in his arms and lays her down as she cries out, and she’s grabbing at him and sobbing into him, _no no no_ , and his name, and he doesn’t know what to do. He’s lost, and as the doctors run in and push him away from her, he sees her hand still reaching out.

He remembers his dream, and the dreams he’s had since - always the same, crows destroying the nest.

Even before the doctors look to one another, turn to Thomasina standing at the foot of their bed and shake their heads, Jack knows there’s nothing to do.

The line of Benjamin is not meant to continue.

***

Lucinda is at the hospital for a week, and Jack is alone.

She comes back. There is no longer blood on the bed, but he can still feel it.

Everything is silent, but Jack can hear Lucinda’s measured breathing beside him. He doesn’t know what to say. He doesn’t reach out for her.

“I’m sorry,” she says, finally, into the dark.

He turns his head, slowly, to look at her. She is staring at the ceiling, lips pressed together. He opens his mouth, “It’s not your fault -”

“That’s not what Thomasina said.”

Sudden, bristling anger, and a desire, not for the first time, to slit the woman’s throat. Pushing it down, he says, “She’s just an extension of my father. It’s not your fault.” _If anything, it’s mine,_ he doesn’t say. He thinks she nods.

“Do you think it will ever work?” she asks. He doesn’t respond. She’s still watching the ceiling. “How long will they wait?”

He figures that, by this point, they’ve bugged the room. He doesn’t answer, and the silence is enough.

***

They go cold.

Lucinda won’t get out of bed.

Jack doesn’t know what to do. He takes breakfast to her, makes her eat, reads to her.

But she’s changed. The part of her that had been holding onto hope has let go. She looks - tired, circles under her eyes, hair falling listlessly around her head. A far cry from the radiant beauty she had been when they met, or the poised elegance she has been in their time here. She doesn’t talk.

Finally, at night, he begs her. “Don’t do this to me,” he says.

Nothing.

“Lucinda, please. I need you.”

He hears her shake her head, rustling the sheets. “I’m replaceable.”

Reaches out, takes her hand. “No. I need you, Lucinda. I can’t - handle this without you. Stay with me,” he swallows, links her delicate fingers with his.

She doesn’t speak, but she doesn’t move.

“Kiss me,” she says after a while, and he closes his eyes. “I can’t -”

“I know. That’s not what I’m asking for. Just kiss me, Jack, please,” she says, and her voice is quiet, shy like the first time she spoke to him.

He does, cupping her head and kissing her, gently. “I will alway protect you,” he whispers, rubbing his thumb against her bottom lip, before leaning in again. She melts into it, and they forget.

***

It’s been almost two years since they first entered the room, and it’s harder to keep up the charade now that there’s almost no hope of escape.

Except -

“David,” he tells her. “David will come. Soon. And then we can leave.”

So they wait.

**Author's Note:**

> The final part is hopefully forthcoming! Thank you so much for reading, comments are welcomed! <3
> 
> Also, maybe you could reblog on [tumblr](http://smilingbucky.tumblr.com/post/93842359783/ficlet-fade-and-then-return-kings)? :)


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